


I'll Kill You And Then Cry At Your Grave

by FrankieOlive



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-23
Updated: 2016-09-23
Packaged: 2018-08-16 20:10:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8115817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrankieOlive/pseuds/FrankieOlive
Summary: Journal entries





	1. Bucky Journal Entry #1

I don't have a lot to say. I was a person and then I wasn't and now I am supposed to be again. That's my whole story in one sentence. I have this big clunky arm and I want people to stare at it more than anything else. I want them to look at how it bends and moves with me, how it folds at just the right points. I want them to trace the red star from afar. I want them to spend their afternoons wondering what it's like to be fused to destruction. I want them to look so hard at my arm they forget that there is supposed to be a human attached. That's how I disappear. It's incredible what a limb can do for you when it looks different from everyone else's. I'm carrying around a parrot on my shoulder, a cat in my arms, a story everyone wants to know but no one wants to ask about. I'm the most famous invisible person you will never meet. I'm the ghost they don't catch, the misshapen cheeto you forget is supposed to look like the rest. I'm a metal arm that happens to be attached to a person. What should be a person. They want the story without the responsibility of responding to it. Empathy is exhausting, both to give and receive. My arm alone is almost enough to make them feel something. They steal a peripheral glance and congratulate themselves on their dishonesty. They watched the preview and are proud they had enough self control to not cough up $13.50 for the movie. They believe I won't notice if they look fast enough. They think it's almost as good as not looking at all. They don't realize, those are what I feel the hardest. They aren't doing it for me, they're doing it for them and I can feel that like cold slime down a dusty mirror. Then there are the ones who let their eyes linger and find and feast. The ones who seem to be convinced I am part of something bigger than them. They believe in a part of me, and I feel that like a warm glowing light.


	2. Steve Journal Entry #1

He won't look at anyone. It's weird when someone you used to have staring contests with won't look you in the eye anymore. It's sort of pathetic but I've been drawing him just so I can look at him. Recently I've been starting with his eyes. I use heavy lines to draw the way he squints. He looks like he's always ready to be hurt. I draw his flared out nostrils and small quiet mouth. I draw his sweeping curtain bangs and the beard he grew to cover up as much of himself as possible. I wonder if he has seen a picture of what he used to look like. I never draw past his face. His features hold the memories of my friend but his body has learned things I could never understand. Who came up with the phrase "a penny for your thoughts"? I would pay a lot more than a penny for one of his thoughts. Does he remember me? Or am I just another stranger trying to convince him that we are friends?


	3. Bucky Journal Entry #2

He used to look even smaller when he slept. He would fade away under all the blankets, still shivering. I would quietly lift up a corner to make sure he was still under there, that he hadn't melted into the bed or followed his fists out into the night. Sometimes I would wake up cold with the blankets barely covering me. I would joke with him that when I fell asleep and that's when evil Steve would take over. He apologized so much that I felt bad I ever brought it up. I started to stay up and put all of the blankets on him once he fell asleep- that way he was never a thief. I handed over my wallet even before he pulled out the gun. He could be who he wanted to even in his dreams. I watched him huddle under his part of the mass, eyelids fluttering. He moved around constantly, a fighter even in his sleep, or just trying to get warmer. With no noise or distractions, time suspended. He spent what felt like days breathing next to me in bed. Watching him helped me rest in a way that sleep never provided. I spent my nights with him safe and honest and I learned how time bends when you are exactly where you want to be.

I dreamt I was on a frozen mountain and he was lying behind me in the snow. I would run back and cover him in the stuff, bury him in his own coffin. I would push snow on top of him until my toes turned blue and my nails fell off, until the peak of the mountain shifted to the spot where I wouldn't stop burying the coldest kid in the world. I would wake up clawing at the bed, looking for more snow with no feeling left in my extremities. I would take back just enough of the blanket to keep him from worrying and then push myself back into a dream where he wasn't suffering anymore. It's odd when you think about it, I could have dreamt about anything. I could have spent my unconscious nights burying him in blankets, but even then I think I knew he was going to have a harder time than that. I was preparing for what I might have to do some day, the way I might have to save him. There's no good way to tell someone that you're ready to kill them if they need you to. 

He has his own room now. Maybe it's for the better. He wouldn't fit in our old bed.


	4. Steve Journal Entry #2

I haven't been drawing him recently. It hurts too much to miss someone you're sitting right next to. I can't stand to recreate images of him on top of that, as if this reality isn't enough. I've been seeing a therapist recently, that's why I'm keeping this journal. She said maybe it would help me to have a place to put all my thoughts, even the ones that I'm afraid are selfish. When Bucky is around I start wiggling my pen around like I'm doodling, I don't want to have to explain why I'm writing- not that he would ask. Bucky always gives me the space to be myself. I wish I knew how to do the same for him. I wish I knew how to help. If he just told me what he needed I could do it. When I look at him I can do anything, I can do everything, except read his stubborn mind. I feel like a shopkeeper and Bucky is a customer who has been walking up and down each aisle for the past hour. As the shopkeeper I'm trying to keep a respectful distance but I know I could help. Even if he doesn't know what item he's looking for, I wish we could at least walk the aisles together.


	5. Bucky Journal Entry #3

We used to go to this market that was really far from our apartment. It was a brutal walk and by the end we stopped about every ten feet. I would always say that I was tired and ask him if we could slow down for a minute. He and I would lean against a shop wall and take big gulping breaths at the same time. I don't know if he actually thought I was tired or if he believed I was just trying to play the part. We never talked about it. I would breathe deep and hope hard and silent that the pale boy next to me got all the air he needed. The market was in the nice part of town, where people struggled to decide which shoes they were going to wear that day. It had the good scraps, bread and sometimes a small piece of fruit. We would gorge and fill our pockets with sustenance for the walk back home. We burned so much energy on the walk that we always ended it hungry. It barely made sense to go but it felt better than staying put and letting our lives happen to us. Even if it was stupid, we were doing something. We started out with the thought of the food on the way there and ended with the thought of home on the way back. Each time I would offer to go by myself and bring back scraps but Steve always said no, that I needed back up. He wanted so badly to help us move forward. In truth I think he was afraid that I was tired of it all; our poverty, his sickness. He walked with me to prove that he could keep up. If I had an easier heart and a bigger mouth I would have told him that he wasn't a burden, he was a choice. I chose an exhausting person to love. He doesn't have to worry, im his boomerang, baby. You could toss me halfway around the earth and I would find my way back to him every time. He is exactly where I want to be.


End file.
